Prime Minister Julia Gillard has tried to clarify comments that she'd rather be in a school watching kids learn to read, than mixing with international leaders on the world stage.
She said that foreign policy was not her passion, an unfortunate comment to make following her debut on the global stage at a meeting involving more than 40 nations.
"It is not foreign policy that brought me into politics, the thing that motivated to first get involved actively in anything political was concern about education ... ," she said.
"Obviously as Prime Minister I work across the full range of names that are in our national interest.
"It is in our national interest to engage in forums such as this one."
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'Jetlag' comments slammed
The PM has turned up the political heat on Tony Abbott by directly contradicting the Coalition's claims the Opposition Leader booked his own trip to Afghanistan before receiving her invitation.
The organising of Mr Abbott's visit to the war-ravaged nation has become a hot topic since saying he missed the PM's recent trip because he was worried about being "jet lagged" for the British Conservative party conference in Birmingham.
Mr Abbott has been slammed by families of Australian soldiers that have died during the long-running conflict for his ill-conceived comments and has since apologised for his gaffe.
Opposition Treasury spokesman Joe Hockey has accused Ms Gillard of "low-rent politics" on the matter as travel plans to war zones have such high levels of security and secrecy attached to them.
Ms Gillard railed at suggestions she had used the situation surrounding her visit of Australian troops in Afghanistan to score political points and flatly denied that Mr Abbott had organised his trip first.
"Your suggestion that he had a fixed date to go when I issued the invitation to him is not correct," she said.
"Simply, not correct."
Ms Gillard spoke just hours before flying out of Brussels at the end of the two-day Asia-Europe meeting (ASEM), her first strides on the global stage as PM.
News Limited newspapers said that Australian Defence Force sources had confirmed to them they had organised Mr Abbott's trip before Ms Gillard had invited her opposite number to join her.
Gillard would have had to approve Mr Abbott's travel plans and that makes the whole situation a little tasty.
She said she had asked Mr Abbott to visit Afghanistan because of the importance of both parties supporting the war effort.
Spirit of 'bipartisanship'
"I thought that was a good way of indicating bipartisanship," she said.
"He made different arrangements, obviously the matter has become the subject of public controversy because of some statements that Mr Abbott made and at no time have I sought to add to that debate."
Well, she did, but only after some probing from journalists in Belgium on Tuesday evening.
Her spat with Mr Abbott, who she used to share a weekly spot with on breakfast television, has easily overshadowed Australia's uneventful first appearance at ASEM.
Ms Gillard held meetings with Vietnam Prime Minister Tan Dung Nguyen and Greek PM George Papandreou during day two of ASEM as well as attending three sessions of the summit.
There are no formal negotiations allowed at ASEM and a raft of outcomes were released at the end of the meeting on Tuesday.
